DevContainer Setup

Getting Started

Open this project in Zed (or any editor with devcontainer support) and open it as a dev container. The container is based on rocker/r-ver:4.5.2 and includes Claude CLI, Quarto, Chromium, git, ssh, and common R system dependencies.

The container runs as a non-root user dev (UID 1000) via the remoteUser setting.

User-Specific Configuration

Several config files are gitignored and need to be set up per user. The initializeCommand creates required directories automatically, but the files themselves need to be provided by each developer.

SSH Keys

Place your SSH key pair in .devcontainer/.ssh/:

.devcontainer/.ssh/<keyfile>
.devcontainer/.ssh/<keyfile>.pub

This directory is symlinked to /home/dev/.ssh/ on container startup. Permissions are set automatically (700 on the directory, 600 on private key files).

To generate a new key:

ssh-keygen -t ed25519 -f .devcontainer/.ssh/id_ed25519 -N ""

Add the public key to your GitHub account under Settings > SSH and GPG keys.

Git Config

Git configuration is split into tracked (shared) and gitignored (personal) parts.

Tracked (.devcontainer/gitconfig): Contains shared settings such as the global gitignore. This is symlinked to /home/dev/.gitconfig and includes the local config via git's [include] directive.

Tracked (.devcontainer/gitignore): Global gitignore patterns applied across all repos (e.g. .DS_Store).

Gitignored (.devcontainer/.gitconfig.local): Personal git settings. Create this file with your identity:

[user]
	name = Your Name
	email = your@email.com

Environment Variables

Create .devcontainer/.env with your tokens:

CLAUDE_CODE_OAUTH_TOKEN=sk-ant-oat01-...
GH_TOKEN=ghp_...

• CLAUDE_CODE_OAUTH_TOKEN: OAuth token from a Claude Max/Pro subscription (not an API key).
• GH_TOKEN: GitHub personal access token, used by gh CLI and GitHub API calls.

R Profile

Shared R settings are in .devcontainer/.Rprofile (tracked), which is symlinked to /home/dev/.Rprofile. This sets up the package library path, binary package installs via Posit Package Manager, and Shiny port forwarding.

For personal R settings, create .devcontainer/.Rprofile.local (gitignored). It is automatically sourced by .devcontainer/.Rprofile if present.

To persist R command history across container rebuilds, add the following to .devcontainer/.Rprofile.local:

Sys.setenv(R_HISTFILE = "/workspace/.devcontainer/.Rhistory")

Shell

The container uses bash. A default .bashrc is provided by the image, extended to source .devcontainer/.bashrc.local if it exists.

For personal shell settings (aliases, prompt, etc.), create .devcontainer/.bashrc.local (gitignored).

Claude CLI

Claude configuration uses two directories that map to Claude's two-tier discovery system:

• .devcontainer/.claude/ → symlinked to ~/.claude (user level)
• .devcontainer/.claude.local/ → bind-mounted to /workspace/.claude (project level)

Shared skills (tracked) live in .devcontainer/.claude/skills/. Each skill is a folder containing a SKILL.md file:

.devcontainer/.claude/skills/blockr-spec/SKILL.md

Skills are available as slash commands (e.g. /blockr-spec) inside the container.

Shared settings (tracked) are in .devcontainer/.claude/settings.json.

Personal skills and settings (gitignored) go in .devcontainer/.claude.local/. This directory is bind-mounted to /workspace/.claude inside the container, so Claude CLI discovers it at the project level. To add a personal skill:

.devcontainer/.claude.local/skills/my-skill/SKILL.md

To override settings locally, create .devcontainer/.claude.local/settings.json.

Session data (history, cache, etc.) also persists in .devcontainer/.claude/ but is gitignored. The file claude.json within is symlinked to /home/dev/.claude.json for user-scoped config (MCP servers, onboarding state).

No manual setup is needed beyond providing CLAUDE_CODE_OAUTH_TOKEN in the .env file.

Lintr

A global lintr config is provided in .devcontainer/.lintr (tracked) and bind-mounted to /workspace/.lintr inside the container. Lintr walks up the directory tree from the file being linted, so the workspace-root mount acts as a fallback for all child repos. Any repo with its own .lintr file will override the global config.

Tracked vs Gitignored Summary

File	Tracked	Purpose
README.md	Yes	This file
AGENTS.md	Yes	Agent instructions
.devcontainer/.claude/skills/	Yes	Shared Claude skills
.devcontainer/.claude/settings.json	Yes	Shared Claude settings
.devcontainer/.claude/ (rest)	No	Claude session data
.devcontainer/.claude.local/	No	Personal Claude skills & settings
.devcontainer/.library/	No	Installed R packages
.devcontainer/Dockerfile	Yes	Container image definition
.devcontainer/devcontainer.json	Yes	DevContainer configuration
.devcontainer/gitconfig	Yes	Shared git config
.devcontainer/.gitconfig.local	No	Personal git identity
.devcontainer/gitignore	Yes	Global gitignore patterns
.devcontainer/.Rprofile	Yes	Shared R settings
.devcontainer/.Rprofile.local	No	Personal R settings
.devcontainer/.Rhistory	No	R command history (opt-in)
.devcontainer/.lintr	Yes	Global lintr config
.devcontainer/.env	No	Auth tokens
.devcontainer/.ssh/	No	SSH keys
.devcontainer/.bashrc.local	No	Personal shell settings